Letters to the Editor
AaronZ
Published Letters: 7
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A change in rhetoric
[Read the article: The American media's fringe ideological view of Pelosi's trip]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]While I don't have anything to add to the main of this post, I was struck by the change in not only tone, but also the language of Cliff May after conceding to the obvious facts of current polls. Here is the quote from Glenn again, this time with the relevant parts in bold:
Back in November, even after the Democrats bested Republicans in the elections, it was assumed that most Americans would be furious over any attempt to de-fund troops engaged in combat. But recent polls [...] suggest that a substantial number of voters no longer see it that way: [...] support for Congress legislating a specific date when American troops will come home is running high.
The first part implies that soldiers in the field will simply run out of funds, becoming forced to fight hand-to-hand once they run out of bullets or something similarly absurd. The second part points out the obvious: that de-funding does not endanger the troops, but simply ends our active role in the conflict. Yet all of the warmongers in the media tend to dishonestly continue the first implication, and even Cliff May can't shake the rhetoric after conceding to the facts.
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disingenuous
[Read the article: Response from ABC News re: the Saddam-anthrax reports]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Two additions to points made in ABC's response and your response to it:
First of all, the disingenuous nature of the so-called "retraction" is even more pronounced when you consider how Ross frames the news of a lack of bentonite. Remember that it was the existence of bentonite in the samples that gave them the justification to finger Saddam Hussein and Iraq, on the say-so of their multiple "well-placed sources." But when Ross finally had to confront the fact that there was no such finding, he did two things. The first, as you mentioned, was in implying that the White House somehow agreed with ABC's sources initially. The second was in this 'graph:
The White House says there are chemical additives in that anthrax including one called silica. Now, that's not a trademark of any one country's weapons program, but it is known to be used, Peter, by Iraq, Russia and the US in making a military-style anthrax.
I would assume that the average viewer would rule out someone in the US military as the culprit, and probably Russia as well since most people consider the Cold War to be ancient history. So here they are still pointing the finger at Iraq, even though the evidence remained inconclusive. It's almost as though Ross is desperately trying to maintain the original point of the claim, which is that Iraq was the responsible party. One has to wonder if journalistic integrity was the motivation here.
Secondly, the retraction itself, if it could be called that, was insufficient for a very simple reason -- again as you pointed out -- that the bentonite story was continually referred to by others, and is still cited as a justification for going to war:
As I documented in the prior post, long after that November 1 comment from Ross which Schneider tries to depict as a retraction, the ABC "bentonite" reports continued to be cited by those -- such as The Weekly Standard -- to argue that Iraq was responsible for the anthrax attacks. Indeed, to this day various pro-war pundits continue to cite those ABC reports as "proof" of a connection between Saddam and the anthrax attacks.
Simply put, if you shout fire in a movie theater and people begin to panic, you have an obligation to "retract" your shouting to calm people down if there is no actual fire that could cause harm. If you say it quietly and a couple next to you sits back down to finish the movie, you might think you've done all you can to restore order (and your credibility). But if others in the theater are obviously still leaving, or checking nervously for smoke, or kicking over old ladies to get out, you have an obligation to again point out your mistake, loudly and clearly, until everyone understands it was a false alarm, and apologize for falsely causing a scare.
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To MacK
[Read the article: Response from ABC News re: the Saddam-anthrax reports]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]FYI, Glenn does mention this fact about the ubiquitousness of bentonite somewhere downthread, including even this ironic little bit:
One ironic fact that illustrates just how commonplace is bentonite is this 2004 Washington Post profile of Dick Cheney, in which his wife, Lynne, fondly recalled the early years of their relationship: "I knew when he was digging ditches out at the Central Wyoming Fair and Rodeo Grounds. And I knew him when he was loading bentonite, hundred-pound bags of bentonite, onto railroad cars."